AP News in Brief at 6:04 p.m. EDT

LONDON (AP) - British police arrested a dozen people Sunday in a widening terrorism investigation after attackers using a van and large knives turned a balmy evening of nightlife into a bloodbath and killed seven people in the heart of London.

Although the attackers were also dead, authorities raced to determine whether others assisted them, and Prime Minister Theresa May warned that the country faced a new threat from copycat attacks.

The county's major political parties temporarily suspended campaigning with only days to go before the general election. May said the vote would take place as scheduled Thursday because "violence can never be allowed to disrupt the democratic process."

The assault unfolded over a few terrifying minutes late Saturday, starting when a rented van veered off the road and barreled into pedestrians on busy London Bridge. Three men then got out of the vehicle with large knives and attacked people at bars and restaurants in nearby Borough Market until they were shot dead by police.

"They went 'This is for Allah,' and they had a woman on the floor. They were stabbing her," witness Gerard Vowls said.

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'Oi, terrorists, cowards!' Fighting back in London's chaos

LONDON (AP) - For eight agonizing minutes, the orders came from all directions, frantic and contradictory. Crowds scattered, sometimes directly into the path of the men trying to kill them. Police cars screamed past the attackers toward the van they had abandoned. Chairs, bottles and even a basket flew through the air as terrified onlookers tried to hold off the three men and make sense out of the senseless.

Gerard Vowls was across the street from a Barclays bank branch when he heard someone moan, "I've been stabbed." He thought it was a joke. But as the man leaned weakly against a wall, the blood was all too real. Moments later, as one bystander helped the wounded man, Vowls saw the three attackers fall upon a nearby woman with their knives.

"The three guys, yes, they were just stabbing this woman constantly, non-stop the three of them. Just stabbing her from every direction, the three of them around her. Lunging at her," he said. "I heard them say one thing: 'This is for Allah.'"

Police cars screeched past the scene, so intent upon the van the attackers had abandoned after plowing it through a crowd at London Bridge that they did not yet know about the mayhem around Borough Market.

Vowls tried to distract the men with knives and warn the unwitting neighborhood filled with crowded restaurants and bars. He shouted as he ran through the streets, according to his account and that of bystanders who believe he saved many lives Saturday night. Doors slammed shut. The attackers retreated from at least one establishment when they were with a barrage of glass bottles.

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Attack brings out the best in London's Borough neighborhood

LONDON (AP) - When Sue Brinklow dashed into The Lord Clyde pub during Saturday night's attack on London Bridge, she was among hundreds of people who found safety and a place to sleep in the Borough neighborhood known for its 1,000-year-old food market and its role as the backdrop for major movies.

"It's a brilliant community," Brinklow said outside the police lines around London Bridge.

Brinklow, 51, and her husband, Steve, were trying to get back to their hotel when she was hustled away by police responding to the van-and-knife attack that killed seven people and injured scores more. Cordons were thrown up amid the chaos, and hundreds of people were left stranded.

That's when the door of The Lord Clyde swung open.

"The landlord said to us, 'Just come in and have a drink. It'll be all right," Brinklow said. "We didn't have to pay for our drinks. He said, 'Just make yourselves comfortable' ... And when we found out how severe it was, we just stayed there."

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Trump may not block Comey testimony at key public hearing

WASHINGTON (AP) - Days before a highly anticipated hearing, President Donald Trump appears unlikely to try and block fired FBI Director James Comey from testifying, as a Senate panel pledged aggressive questioning into whether the president sought to obstruct a probe into his campaign's relationship with Russia.

Comey, ousted last month amid the FBI investigation into possible Trump campaign ties to Russia, is set to testify Thursday before the Senate intelligence committee. The public hearing is expected to shed light on his private conversations with Trump in the weeks before his dismissal, including one discussion in which Trump allegedly asked Comey to drop an investigation of former national security adviser Michael Flynn and his Russian contacts.

There's been no final decision as to whether Trump would invoke executive privilege, and the matter remains under discussion, according to two administration officials who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss private deliberations. Trump's known to change his mind on major issues.

Lawmakers from both parties urged Trump not to stand in the way of Comey's testimony.

"Clearly, it would be very, very troubling if the president of the United States is interfering in investigations that affect potentially the president and his closest associates," said Sen. Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the Senate intelligence committee. He said invoking executive privilege would be on "shaky legal ground" and stressed that Comey deserved to have his "day in court" after repeated attacks by Trump and reports of undue pressure.

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Run, Hide, Tell? London attack response likely saved lives

As reports of stabbings in a popular London nightspot started flowing in late Saturday, police sent out a tweet warning people in the area to run, hide and then call authorities.

Desperate officers on the scene also shouted at bystanders to run.

The Run, Hide, Tell strategy - known in the U.S. as Run, Hide, Fight - has been credited with saving lives in certain circumstances. But some say the strategy isn't perfect, especially when a victim's first instinct might be to freeze on the spot.

Saturday's attack began when a van drove into pedestrians on busy London Bridge. Three men wielding large knives got out of the van and attacked people at nearby bars and restaurants. The men killed seven people and injured roughly 50 before they were shot dead by police.

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Late in life, sex assault trial caps Cosby's life and legacy

PHILADELPHIA (AP) - Bill Cosby doesn't plan to testify when he goes on trial Monday on sexual assault charges, but the rambling, remarkable testimony he gave in the accuser's lawsuit could still prove pivotal.

The deposition from a decade-old sexual battery lawsuit, unsealed by a judge in 2015 at the request of The Associated Press, showed the once-beloved comedian's dark side.

Cosby, a champion of family life after a 50-year marriage and five children, detailed his practice of inviting young actresses, models, flight attendants and waitresses to meetings that often featured pills and alcohol - and turned sexual. He called some of them mere "liaisons."

But Andrea Constand, he said, was different. Cosby was a mentor and friend to the former Temple University basketball team staffer. She will take the stand this week and tell her story in public for the first time.

Judge Steven O'Neill hopes to keep the media frenzy from dominating the case as it did at O.J. Simpson's murder trial. Like the Simpson case, the Cosby jury will be sequestered. On the other hand, cameras aren't allowed in Pennsylvania courtrooms, as they were in the Simpson trial. But scores of photographers will be lined up outside the courthouse.

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Suspect in Portland attack made life about hate after prison

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) - The suspect charged with fatally stabbing two Portland men who tried to stop his anti-Muslim tirade against two teenage girls built a life around hate speech and his right to use it.

Jeremy Joseph Christian, who has spent much of his adulthood behind bars, littered social media with erratic and menacing posts about his hatred of just about everything and everyone. He made death threats against Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump and ranted when Facebook deleted an anti-Semitic update.

"There is no feeling like being muzzled. Cut out your tongue," he wrote in one post.

After years of spewing anger, prosecutors say, Christian acted on his fury last week aboard a light-rail train. He's accused of screaming anti-Muslim insults at the girls, ages 16 and 17, and then slitting the throats of three men who came to their defense. Two of the men died, and a third was seriously wounded.

Christian continued screaming about free speech in the back of a patrol car, according to court documents. "Get stabbed in your neck if you hate free speech," he is quoted as saying. "I can die in prison a happy man."

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After liberation from IS, Fallujah struggles to rebuild

FALLUJAH, Iraq (AP) - Even as Iraqi forces in Mosul close in on the last pockets of urban territory still held by the Islamic State group, residents of Fallujah in Iraq's Sunni heartland are still struggling to rebuild nearly a year after their neighborhoods were declared liberated from the extremists.

After declaring the city liberated last June, Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi called the victory a major step toward unifying Iraq more than two years after nearly a third of the country fell to IS. "Fallujah has returned to the nation," he declared in a speech broadcast nationwide.

But in the months that followed, while the Iraqi government compiled databases and set up tight checkpoints on the main roads in and out of Fallujah to screen residents for suspected ties with IS, it provided little in the way of reconstruction money, local officials say. Sheikh Talib Al-Hasnawi, the head of Fallujah's municipal council, said international aid is what has provided electricity, repaired water pumps and built filtration systems.

"We have a real problem with (IS) sleeper cells," he said, adding that what Fallujah needs most is a strong security force to prevent the extremists from re-establishing a foothold in the city some 65 kilometers (40 miles) west of Baghdad. "Honestly the support from Baghdad has been very weak," he added, noting that his repeated requests for more equipment and arms for the city's local police have gone unheeded.

"So mostly we are relying on the civilians to alert us to threats," he said. "All we can provide are the very basics."

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50 years on, Israel keeps tight grip on Palestinian economy

SALFIT, West Bank (AP) - Fuad Maraita's alarm goes off at 3:30 a.m. His hometown of Salfit, in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, still lies in darkness.

He drinks a cup of strong Arabic coffee and a glass of milk in silence. A few minutes later, he slings a cloth bag with his lunch over his shoulder, gets on a minibus and starts the grueling journey to his job laying tiles at a construction site near Tel Aviv.

Maraita, 62, is one of tens of thousands of Palestinians who make the long trek to Israel on any given day. Fifty years after Israel captured the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem, this army of laborers is one of the most visible signs of the occupation.

Israeli control has held back the Palestinian economy, making decent-paying jobs in the territories scarce. Stripped of choices, Palestinians work in Israel, where their average pay is the minimum wage- still more than double what they would earn at home. For Israel, they are a source of cheap labor, building homes, fixing cars and serving food.

Laying tiles in Israel has become a Maraita family tradition, passed down from Maraita's late father to him, his four brothers, and one of his sons. The distance between Salfit and Tel Aviv is just 30 miles (48 kilometers), but travel restrictions, including a ban on Palestinian cars entering Israel, keep him on the road for almost as much time each day as he spends working.

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Grande, Bieber, Katy Perry sing at Manchester benefit show

MANCHESTER, England (AP) - Ariana Grande returned to the Manchester stage two weeks after a suicide bombing killed 22 victims at her concert in the city, singing upbeat and motivational pop anthems as the audience cheered loudly for the singer.

Grande emerged onstage for the One Love Manchester concert Sunday, held at the city's Old Trafford cricket ground. She appeared emotional as she performed "Be Alright" and "Break Free." Before her performance, she and her dancers held hands in solidarity.

"Manchester, we're gonna be all right," she yelled. Confetti burst following the performance.

One of the most powerful moments of the concert was when the Parrs Wood High School Choir sang Grande's "My Everything" with the singer. The 23-year-old singer held the young lead performer's hand, both teary-eyed, as the rest of the singers joined in.

Katy Perry also left a mark with her resilient performance: She sang a stripped down version of her hit, "Part of You." Backed by two singers and a guitarist, Perry delivered the song wearing all white, singing, "Throw your sticks and your stones, throw your bombs and your blows, but you're not gonna break my soul."